Getting Showered

I had planned to write this post last week but after working a 15 hour day on Tuesday I just never found the time or energy.

Last weekend my sweet bridesmaids, mom, and future mother-in-law threw me an amazing bridal shower. The whole day was absolutely perfect. The attention that they put into the decorations, food, games, and gifts really captured me and P.

The weekend started with some of the girls getting into town on Friday night. We ordered pizza, drank wine, and watched 27 Dresses. They surprised me with a gift card to a spa for Saturday morning to get a mani, pedi, and my hair styled while they were hard at work getting the shower set up. It was the perfect way to start the day! My friend Jenny was giving the tough task of joining me at the spa. I was so happy to spend the morning catching up with her!

The shower was held on the 11th floor of our apartment building. We are lucky that our apartment has a beautiful party room with a kitchen and lots of seating. It was the perfect area to have the shower and still have a warm and cozy feel. The room was decked out with cherry blossom decorations and many pictures and memorabilia to capture me and P. Here are some pic from the day. Unfortunately I did not get a picture of myself with the lovely hostesses.

Each guest was asked to bring scrapbooking supplies to fill these awesome organization cubes. Everyone knew me so well!

The room was filled with pictures and scrapbooks of P and I. The blue sign was made to replicate the night P proposed.

French Minnie and German Mickey made an appearance. Special shout out to P for the awesome playlist he made!

Chatting with some of my favorite ladies. Check out the special DC wine glass in front me.

Game time! I believe this was during "Where in the world are P & E?" I love Allison's expression! Each guest was also asked to share their favorite memory of me and/or P and I had to guess who wrote it. So fun!

Most pictures of me opening gifts are not very flattering. I had to include this one of me laughing after reading the card from Jenny. Her card was an engagement card that had a great line about if we are living together we might as well get a bunch of free stuff. Everyone in the room loved it!

Group shot during game time. On the couch is my mom (blue sweater), P's sister, P's mom, and P's cousin Kristen who will be singing at our wedding.

Another group shot. Check out the banner hanging up -  we are planning to use it at the rehearsal dinner.

After the shower a lot of the girls joined me in my apartment. We all relaxed and loaded up on caffeine before heading to dinner at my favorite mexican restaurant, Tortilla Coast. Although we had originally planned to go straight to the bars after dinner we decided to head back to my apartment since it was still early. We ended up just staying at my apartment all night, drinking wine and enjoying lots of fun girl talk. Honestly, it was the perfect night for me. I joked with a few of the girls that if this had been five years ago the night probably would have been a little crazier - I guess we are just getting old! Here is a picture of me and the girls after dinner:

I seriously have the best group of sisters and friends. I feel so blessed!

Last Monday I put some of the scrapbooking goodies to use right away and made this keepsake for all of the cards I received at the shower. I saw the idea on Pinterest and plan to make one (or two) for our wedding cards too.

With the shower behind me, we are down to 48 days until the wedding. We are both getting so excited!!

Wedding Wednesday

With less than 70 days to go until April 13th (66 to be exact) we have been checking LOTS of things off of the ever growing to-do list.

This past Saturday we mailed our invitations! We went back and forth on when to send them. 12 weeks? 10 weeks? 8 weeks? We had read that any of these timeframes was appropriate. Ultimately we decided to send them 10 weeks before the wedding since we are inviting guests from all over the United States and Germany. By mailing them out 10 weeks in advance it gives everyone more than enough time to receive them, send back their reply cards, and make their travel arrangements. It's been fun getting so many sweet messages from friends and family this week as they've been checking their mailboxes!

Obligatory picture of us before going into the post office

In addition to sending out the invitations last weekend we also finalized the groomsmen attire and met with the music director at our church. She was AH-mazing and really helped guide us to pick beautiful, meaningful and holy songs for our wedding mass.

Yesterday my awsome MOB (mother-of-the-bride) came down to DC for lunch and a trip to the florist. She helped pull together her and P's mom's ideas (which were identical) with mine and P's vision. I cannot wait to see our flowers in two months! I took her to the bakery where we ordered our cake and we split a sampling of one of the flavors our guests will be enjoying. Yum!

Tonight is my hair and make-up trial. I had really hoped to do this the morning of my shower but in the end I'm glad it is today so that my hair and make-up will be a surprise to everyone. My sweet (future) sister-in-law has been working in the area this past week and will be joining me at the salon.

This weekend is my second dress fitting and P's parents are coming to town so we can have dinner at the rehearsal dinner location.  Next weekend is my bridal shower and bachelorette festivities. While me and my favorite ladies are taking over DC, P is headed to NYC with the guys for his bachelor weekend!

We are getting SOO close to April! I'm ready to walk down that aisle and say I Do!

OpenTable

Do you use OpenTable in your area? If not, I highly recommend you get an account and use it every time you need to make a reservation. Why? Each reservation earns you 100 points which add up to gift certificates! P and I have been using OpenTable for 5+ years to make reservations for meals with family, friends, and special occasions. I always noticed we were each earning points on our accounts but never knew what they were for. Last week P explained to me that he was only 200 points (or two reservations) away from earning a $50 gift certificate. After checking my account we realized I had already earned 5,000 points and was eligible for a $50 gift certificate! Of course I redeemed those points right away and now in 3-4 weeks we will get our first "dining cheque" just in time for Valentine's Day.

This weekend....

I'm easing back into the blog-o-sphere with a bulleted post summarizing our long, 3-day weekend. This weekend.....

• we spent time resting and recovering from the nasty head colds and sinus infections that have been plaguing our apartment the last two weeks
• had our cake tasting - yum!
• worked on assembling and stuffing invitations
• got lots of laundry done
• avoided the crazy amount of tourists that were in DC for the Inauguration
• I went to the gym twice to "sweat for the dress"! It felt good to be back after a brief hiatus (see first bullet)
• enjoyed watching the Inauguration festivities on tv. I will never forget going to President Obama's first Inguration on a freezing day in January 2009, but it was so nice to watch everything from the warmth of our couch this year

Happy Tuesday, so happy for a short week!

100 Days!

I didn't do a "Wedding Wednesday" post yesterday because today marks exactly 100 days until April 13th! It is so exciting and scary at the same time. I am by no means scared to marry P, I could have done that years ago. But the amount of details and logistics that need to be thought of and accounted for between now and then can be mind blowing. I think P and I have done a good job of taking things a little bit at a time and getting a head start in some areas to make our lives less crazy as the day gets closer. I'm also learning that we don't have to do everything the weekend of the wedding and it is okay to lean on others for help.

This month we will be tackling:

• Food tasting at the reception venue
• Cake tasting
• Dress fitting
• Finalizing groomsmen attire
• Ordering wedding bands. (We've actually already picked our wedding bands and are just waiting on the final pricing quote to order them)
• Sending out invitations
• Meeting with priest and finalizing mass readings

Whew! Although honestly those are a lot of fun things to do, especially the food and cake tastings! If things are quiet over here for a weeks I apologize but you can find me stuffing envelopes or on the treadmill!

Happy New Year

Happy New Year! I am very excited for 2013, for obvious reasons!

I was hoping to share some pictures from our snowy Christmas in Ohio but I sadly took none. I caught a nasty stomach virus on Christmas Eve and spent most of Christmas Day in bed - it was as miserable as it sounds. P was also suffering from a head cold so were both under the weather. Most of our visit was spent relaxing and getting better while enjoying the snow. We left Ohio last Friday and unfortunatley left his dad with my stomach bug and his mom with his cold.

We had a low key weekend of continued recooperation and unpacking. On Sunday we got to have brunch with Matt who was in town for a quick visit from NYC. P will be going up to NYC next month for his bachelor weekend and we realized I won't see Matt again until the wedding rehearsal - so crazy!

Our NYE was also low key. In the past we have had amazing nights ringing in the new year at the Newseum, DC bars, and friends homes. This year, especially since we were both on the mend, we opted to go out for a late lunch and stayed in to watch Netflix and sip wine (me) and beer (P) while we waited for the countdown. It was nice to be cozied up on the couch with Calvin as we counted down to midnight. The result was that we both woke up on New Year's Day with more energy and less fuzziness than we have in recent years.

I am looking forward to 2013 and all of the memories that will be made this year!

Pack your patience

Tomorrow P and I are driving up to Ohio to spend the holidays with his family. As has been the tradition for several years we will be giving our friend Jenny a ride so she can meet up with her family. This year we will be joined by several million travelers who are expected to be hitting the roads on Saturday for the holidays. So as my lovely friend Erin said to me earlier this week, we will pack our patience and enjoy the ride! Hope everyone has a safe and magical Christmas!